1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and an apparatus for selecting a harmonic color using the harmonics, and a method and an apparatus for converting sound to color or color to sound, and more particularly to a method and an apparatus capable of converting a sound into a color image or an image into a sound, by selecting the harmonic color exactly tuned with an optional reference color based on the harmonics, and frequency conversion of a sound or a color having a characteristic of wave.
2. Description of the Related Art
According to the popularization of color due to the color television broadcasting, the economical value of the color is increased. Accordingly, it is very important for web designers, artists, architects, interior decorators, industrial designers, landscape architects, dress designers, stage directors, creators of various fields, and purchasers to select the harmonic color.
The term xe2x80x98color harmonyxe2x80x99 means two or more colors are used in close to each other to give a good effect.
According to the conventional color harmony, the harmony color is selected by reference to a book printed in a color of which an optional reference color is printed and the harmony colors harmonizing with the reference color are printed as a natural color based on visual experience of human. The standard of representative color harmony is a Coloring Book, a Munsell Colorimetric System, and CIE Standard Colorimetric system.
However, the conventional lacks of objectivity in that the method is based on the human experience or the experiment. Because the harmony color is selected by the visible sense by reference to the printed reference material, the accuracy of the color may be reduced. In addition, it is impossible to use the printed reference for a Desk Top Publishing system using a computer.
In a converting method sound to color deriving the harmony color from the harmony music, the color and the sound are different to the band of frequency adapted to the sense of sight and hearing, but are identical to the property of physical wave. However, it has not been studied on the reversible conversion of the color and the sound.
The conventional sound pressure displaying apparatus which is representative of a graphic equalizer visualizing the change of the sound displays only magnitude of the sound pressure each a band of frequency, thereby providing a disadvantage of simply displaying the image and limiting the application range.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,046,724 issued to Havass discloses a method and an apparatus for the conversion of sound waves to light. According to the Havass patent, the light matching a sound is displayed by controlling three color light sources of RGB based on each frequency and the magnitude of the sound through 6 filter means corresponding from 3 octave to 8 octave.
Therefore, a major object of the invention is to solve the problems involved in the related art, and to provide a method and an apparatus capable of selecting the harmonic color exactly tuned with an optional reference color based on the harmonics.
Other object of the invention is to provide a sound/color converting table capable of easily seeing the conversion of sound and color, in which 12 musical scale degrees and 12 color system corresponding to 10 octave and 10 luminance are arranged on a first coordinate axis in a relationship of 1:1.
The other object of the invention is to provide a musical instrument capable of recognizing the color in a scale degree by coloring the scale degree position based on the sound/color converting table.
Another object of the invention is to provide objective and credible systematic frequency conversion criterion using wave of color and sound, that is, frequency characteristics to provide a method and an apparatus capable of converting a sound into a color image or an image into a sound by converting visual and audible frequency into audible and visual frequency based on the above criterion.
Still another object of the invention is to provide a method and an apparatus of determining a sound source position to display the stereo sound source position in sound/color conversion.
The other object of the invention is to provide a musical instrument capable of recognizing the color in a scale degree by coloring the scale degree position based on the sound/color converting table.
The musical scale degree dividing rate is any one of an average rate or a just temperament. In case of average rate, the harmony color can be obtained as following equation:
Fh=Frxc3x97(k{square root over (2)})n
wherein, Fh denotes a harmony frequency to be obtained, Fr denotes an input frequency, k denotes the number of the musical scale degree which is resulted from dividing a frequency of one octave by a constant rate, n denotes a harmony frequency ratio and 1xe2x89xa6nxe2x89xa6(kxe2x88x921), in which k and n are natural number.
In other aspect of the present invention, there is provided an apparatus of selecting a harmony color comprising: means for selecting the musical scale degree dividing rate, a harmonics code, and a reference color; means for storing a table of the harmony frequency ratio of the harmony scale degree by the harmonics code according to the musical scale degree dividing rate; means for operating a luminance of the selected reference color, determining an octave corresponding to the luminance, and operating a frequency of the harmonic color from the referenced frequency by reference to a harmony frequency ratio of the selected harmonics code in the table, and, if the operated harmonic color frequency is deviated from a band of visible frequency, converting the harmonic color frequency into the band of visible frequency and then displaying the operated harmonic color frequency as the referenced harmonic color.
In the other aspect of the present invention, there is provided a sound/color converting table, wherein 12 musical scale degrees and 12 color system as 12 equivalent width are arranged on a first coordinate axis in a relationship of 1:1 by setting xe2x80x98doxe2x80x99 of musical scale degree and xe2x80x98redxe2x80x99 of a color system to an original point of the coordinates, and 10 octaves and 10 luminance are arranged on a second coordinate axis in relationship of 1:1. The sound/color converting table is any one of circular coordinate system and orthogonal coordinate system. A xe2x80x98redxe2x80x99 of the color system has a wavelength of which xe2x80x98do, mi, solxe2x80x99 of the musical scale degree is approximate to xe2x80x98red, green, bluexe2x80x99 of the color system.
The circular coordinate system is set that the first coordinate axis is in a direction of circumference, and the second coordinate axis is in a direction of a center of circle.
The orthogonal coordinate system is made in such a way that the luminance is in direct proportion to the musical scale degree.
In another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a musical instrument which corresponds to the musical scale degree position being colored by a sound/color converting table.
In still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of converting a sound to a color, the method comprising the steps of: Fourier-transform of sound source; sampling at least one signal of particular audible frequency among the Fourier-transformed signals; converting at least one sampled signal of the audible frequency into a signal of a visible frequency using following equation; and displaying a color corresponding to at least one converted visible frequency:
F=Flxc3x972x*
BFxe2x88x9dx
wherein,       x    =                            log          2                ⁢                  (                                    f              i                                      f              l                                )                    +              C        xe2x80x2              ,
F is a visible frequency to be obtained, Fl is a reference visible frequency, a positive number of x is a value of octave, BF is a luminance of color, x* is places of decimals and denotes a height of sound in one octave, fi is a sampled audible frequency, fl is a reference audible frequency, Cxe2x80x2 is a constant and denotes a real number between 0xe2x89xa6Cxe2x80x2xe2x89xa61.
The sampling step includes the steps of inputting the Fourier-transformed signal every a constant time interval in a frame; obtaining one or more peak values every a frame; classifying the obtained peak values in order of sound pressure level; and obtaining the desired number of peak values in order of sound pressure level.
The displaying step displays an image colored with the converted color and having a magnitude in proportion to a sound pressure of each peak value at a frequency position of each sampled peak value. The displaying step displays an image colored with the converted color and having motions of animation in proportion to a sound pressure of each peak value at each position of the animation corresponding to a frequency of each sampled peak value. The displaying step overlaps and displays each overlapping image having a magnitude in proportion to a sound pressure of every peak value at a desired position.
In still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of converting a sound to a color, the method comprising the steps of: Fourier-transforming a number of inputted sound sources through a number of channels; sampling at least one signal of particular audible frequency among the Fourier-transformed signals; deriving a sound source position between a number of channels using the signals of audible frequency corresponding to each other; converting at least one sampled signal of the audible frequency among a number of sampled signal into a signal of a visible frequency; and displaying a color corresponding to at least one converted visible frequency according to a frequency and sound position:
The sound source generating position in the sound source input position of a number of channels is operated as following equation:       I    diff    =      k    ⁢          (                        1                                    s              2                        +                          a              2                                      -                  1                                    s              2                        +                                          (                                  d                  -                  a                                )                            2                                          )      
wherein, a is a value of sound source generating position to be obtained by setting the sound source input position of a first channel to zero, d is a distance from the sound source input position of the first channel to the sound source input position of a second channel, s is a distance extending at right angle from a straight line extending between the sound source input positions of two channels to the actual sound source, k is a constant of k greater than 0, and Idiff is a sound pressure value of the first channel minus a sound pressure value of the second channel at a particular peak.
In still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an apparatus of converting a sound into a color, the apparatus comprising: means for inputting the sound; means for amplifying the input sound; means for Fourier-transforming the amplified sound; means for sampling at least one signal of particular audible frequency among the Fourier-transformed signals; means for converting at least one sampled signal of the audible frequency into a signal of a visible frequency; and means for displaying a color corresponding to at least one converted visible frequency.
In still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an apparatus of converting a sound into a color, the apparatus comprising: means for Fourier-transforming a number of inputted sound sources through a number of channels; means for amplifying the input sound; means for Fourier-transforming the amplified sound; means for sampling at least one signal of particular audible frequency among the Fourier-transformed signals; means for operating a sound source position between a number of channels using the signals of audible frequency corresponding to each other; means for converting at least one sampled signal of the audible frequency into a signal of a visible frequency; and means displaying a color corresponding to at least one converted visible frequency from every a audible frequency according to sound position.
The displaying means is any one of a display appliance such as CRT and LCD, a full color display lamp, an illumination unit such as a color laser light source apparatus.
In still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of converting a color into a sound, the method comprising: obtaining a visible frequency Fi and a luminance BFi corresponding to an input color; converting the obtained visible frequency into a audible frequency by following equation; and outputting the converted audible frequency in a sound:
f=flxc3x972x+BFi
wherein,       x    =                            log          2                ⁢                  (                                    F              i                                      F              l                                )                    +      C        ,
f is a visible frequency to be obtained, fl is a reference visible frequency, a positive number of x is a value of octave, BFi is a luminance of Fi and denotes a constant between 1xe2x89xa6BFixe2x89xa610, and C is a constant and denotes a real number between 0xe2x89xa6Cxe2x80x2xe2x89xa61 determined by the reference frequency.
In still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an apparatus of converting a color into a sound, the apparatus comprising: means for obtaining a visible frequency Fi and a luminance BFi corresponding to an input color; means for converting the obtained visible frequency into a audible frequency; and means for outputting the converted audible frequency in a sound:
In still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of sampling a position of a sound source, the method comprising: inputting a sound obtained from a number of channels spaced apart in a constant interval; Fourier-transforming the inputted sound through each channel; sampling a peak value of the Fourier-transformed signal; and operating a sound source generating position between a number of channels using a sound pressure of a number of channels at each sampled frequency.
The sound source generating position between the sound source input position of a number of channels is operated as following equation:       I    diff    =      k    ⁢          (                        1                                    s              2                        +                          a              2                                      -                  1                                    s              2                        +                                          (                                  d                  -                  a                                )                            2                                          )      
wherein, a is a value of sound source generating position to be obtained by setting the sound source input position of a first channel to zero, d is a distance from the sound source input position of the first channel to the sound source input position of a second channel, s is a distance extending at right angle from a straight line extending between the sound source input positions of two channels to the actual sound source, k is a constant of k greater than 0, and Idiff is a sound pressure value of the first channel minus a sound pressure value of the second channel at a particular peak.
The sound source generating position between the sound source input position of a number of channels is operated as following equation:
Ediff=M1energyxe2x88x92M2energy
If Ediff greater than 0, the sound source generating position is close to the first channel,
If Ediff less than 0, the sound source generating position is close to the second channel,
Energy=xcexa3(P12+P22+ . . . Pn2)
wherein, Ediff is a value of the sound source generating position with the middle position between two channels being zero, Pn is a value of sound pressure level having a detected peak, n is the number of detected peak, M1energy is a value of sound pressure energy of the first channel, and M2energy is a value of sound pressure energy of the second channel.
In still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an apparatus of selecting a position of a sound source, the apparatus comprising: means for inputting a sound from the sound source through a number of channels spaced apart in a constant interval; means for Fourier-transforming the inputted sound through each channel; means for sampling a peak value of the Fourier-transformed signal; and means for operating a sound source generating position between a number of channels using a sound pressure of each selected sample obtained from a number of channels.